


Oh Captain, My Captain

by pretzel_logic



Series: oneiriad's creature AU bingo board [3]
Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Alternate Universe - Space Age, Alternate Universe - Space Fish, Implied Goldvibe, M/M, Other, do you ever get a really weird idea and feel obligated to write it?, implied Lisa/Sara, that's this fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 04:51:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8432506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pretzel_logic/pseuds/pretzel_logic
Summary: Len, Lisa, and Mick on their ship the Heatwave are some of the most infamous space pirates of the era. As far as the Time Masters are aware anyways. The truth is a bit more complicated.Len and Mick never could agree on who exactly had stolen whom.





	

**Author's Note:**

> If you have seen me posting about Space Fish on tumblr, this is it.
> 
> Inspired by that coldwave creature AU bingo board.

Rip Hunter was going into a great recruitment spiel all doom and gloom about some future invasion that would raze the Earth. Lisa shared an uncomfortable look with her brother. Mick, the _Heatwave_ , had been their home since they’d left Central City when Lisa was eight. Earth was more of a vacation home for them but still a home. The idea it might one day be gone made the two of them uncomfortable. Losing Earth would mean losing what few good memories of their childhood they had.

Then Rip used a holo display to show his recruits what the invading army looked like. Lisa gasped as Len cursed in Tamaran. 

Everyone else on the rooftop looked startled by Len’s rather vocal reaction but Hunter recovered first.

“Yes, Mr. And Miss Snart, as you can see, the invading force somehow discovered an armada’s worth of Promethetic ships. You two are rather infamous for having acquired a fighter ship modeled after them,” Rip said as he looked between the Snart siblings and the display. “I rather hope you will be able to shed some light on where these ships were discovered,” Rip added carefully as Len settled down into a calm fury.

Lisa laughed until she was ready to cry and then jabbed a finger into Len’s chest. “This is all your fault,” she declared with complete certainty. “Yours and Mick’s.”

Len crossed his arms defensively and glared at Lisa, which she knew was Lenny’s way of acknowledging she was right while denying it. “How is this invasion my fault?”

Lisa laughed sharply. “Be serious, Lenny. You promised Mick to help him find his own kind, you’ve been searching for over a decade now. And I’ve heard Mick wax poetic about your relationship as much as he does about solar flares. You don’t honestly believe that the two of you finding Mick’s kind has nothing to do with this invasion?”

Lenny remained damningly silent and sulked some more.

“I’m sorry, are you saying the pilot of the _Heatwave_ is a Promethian?” Professor Stein spoke up, clearly shocked the two space pirates knew a surviving member of the most revered race in the Universe. All advanced spacecrafts were reversed engineered from Promethetic ships occasionally found drifting out of dead space.

“Mick prefers Space Fish,” Len admitted grudgingly.

~*~

Len was fourteen and scared out of his mind. Not for himself, Len knew how to take care of himself, but Lisa - Lisa was just a kid. She did not know better when their father started making noise about how it was time for Lisa to start earning her way. Lise just thought Dad meant it was time for her small and nimble fingers to be used on heists. She did not understand how valuable she was to the right kind of people. Metahumans were worth a fortune on the black market. Dad was no long term planner. He did not care for the money Lisa could make for him in the future as his daughter. All he saw was a metahuman that he could sell off for instant wealth. Len had to get her away.

Thankfully Central City had a space port that was a hub of activity, legal and not so much. It’d be easy to escape on one of the public transport ships destined for Mars or further. It’d be easy to track them and return them to Dad as well. Going to the less reputable sections of the space port instead was risky, especially with Lisa, but Len was willing to take it. He had a gun that could at least act like a noise maker if trouble found them. 

So Len talked to his usual fencers, made it sound like he was on resented babywatch as he found someone willing to deliver some questionable product for Dad. Lisa was a professional and acted as unhappy to be stuck at the space port with Len as he pretended to be with her. Better to act like it was business as usual instead of desperate teens in need of help. That kind of honesty would only give them trouble they couldn’t afford.

Things had been going well until Len heard the Santini arrive. Someone must have called Dad, curious about whatever goods he wanted off world and Dad worked out the truth of the matter.

“Lenny,” Lisa whispered, brown eyes wide with terror as she stared up at him. He had not told her the truth, had not had the heart to do so. All Lisa knew was that Dad’s plans were bad and Len was determined to protect her.

Len squeezed her small hand and did his best to smile. “It’s okay. We’ll just hide for a bit,” he whispered back and quietly but quickly led Lisa into the hodgepodge collection of spaceships. 

Their best bet was the Junkyard. Not that it was actually a junkyard but junking spaceships was expensive. Paying for a month or two for port space for your unwanted ship and then letting the space port seize your space ship was far more affordable.

Len could not say why he picked the ship he did when it was so clearly alien. It was also pretty plain looking for an alien space, a dull matte white with vibrant orange accents and windows tinted similarly. The ship was small and looked to be a fighter that was typically kept on a much bigger space ship. Hardly the smuggling freighter with hundreds of hiding spots to use that Len originally sought. Still, maybe the tiny ship would be overlooked for the same reasoning.

Choosing that ship was the best decision Len ever made in his life.

~*~

Len was startled awake as a shockwave rattled the ship and tossed him from the bed. Not for the first time he was rather grateful he kept his bedroom minimalistic. It had saved him from bashing his head on furniture more than once. Shame he couldn’t say the same about the floor.

“Mick!” he called out as he started to stand only to get knocked over by yet another shock wave. “What the hell is going on?”

Whatever explosion had rocked the ship seemed to stop so Len cautiously stood up and started to make his way to the cockpit. Not that it was much of one even with some of the interface technology he and Lisa had made efforts to acquire.

“Get your panties out of a twist, Captain. Just blowing up an asteroid,” Mick said, obviously distracted but not in any way that raised alarm. The viewing port of the cockpit certainly showed nothing amiss aside from a noticeable amount of small rocks drifting in space around them.

“Mickie, we’ve been over this. Not while we’re sleeping,” Lisa said as she leaned against the doorway. 

Len frowned as he took in the dark bags under her eyes and exhaustion in her posture. Lisa put up a good front but Len made a note to schedule a visit to Star Labs. Cisco never had it in him to turn Lisa away when she needed help. If it was a metahuman problem team Flash could fix it and if it was something more… personal, Cisco could fix that as well.

“I was bored an’ hungry. Now I’m neither,” Mick said stubbornly, though his tone implied he felt at least a little sorry to have woken them up. 

“I thought Lenny getting a separate room was supposed to fix your boredom,” Lisa teased with a faux innocent tone.

Len grimaced before he could stop himself. Definitely a personal problem.

“Already fucked Leonard. Why do ya think I was bored?” Mick explained with a grumble that had Len wishing he could crawl into a black hole and die. Mick and Lisa were far to good at over sharing.

Lisa let out a mock gasp. “A captain not seeing to the needs of his ship? Tut-tut Lenny,” she teased before her face grew cold and vicious. “Fix. It.”

Without further ado, Lisa walked a back to her room and arched a delicate brow at Len as the door closed.

“I’m up for another round if you are,” Mick growled out in a tone that was filled with filthy promises.

Len was grateful no one was around to see how flustered he was. “Wait til I’m back in my quarters. And Mick-”

“Yeah, Captain?”

“Plot a course for Star Labs. Lisa deserves some pampering after this.”

~*~

Len and Mick becoming _Len and Mick_ was an accident.

He was fourteen when he snuck aboard the Heatwave with Lisa. Len was something of a late-bloomer and puberty hit him like a sack of bricks a year later. It was beyond mortifying to share a bed with Lisa while having wet dreams but it was not like there was a second room Len could move into, there was only the one. Len took to leaving Mick to watch Lisa while he went planetside to try and handle his new needs. 

Didn’t take Len long to learn he had absolutely no preferences in bed partners, though it took him feeling like shit to realize the only bed partner he wanted was Mick. That was beyond impossible so Len buried his feelings on the matter as deeply as he could and tried not to think about how Lisa was only a few years from puberty herself. 

Mick picked up easily enough something was wrong but Len refused to talk about it. As was typical of him, Mick took matters into his own hands.

Len can’t even remember what he was originally dreaming about, someone human and male about to have sex with him. Then suddenly the man had Mick’s voice. 

“Leonard, what the hell?” Mick demanded in honest confusion that made the new dream so perfect.

“Mick,” Len breathed out barely above a whisper, wrapping his arms around broad shoulders to kiss Mick. 

Mick pushed him away gently but kept his human arms resting at Len’s hips. “Well, this is different,” he murmured fingers dancing along Len’s skin. “What was that you did just then?”

“It was a kiss, Mick, it’s what humans do when we like someone,” Len explained, far too used to explaining everything else about humans to mind Mick’s distraction. 

Mick hummed thoughtfully before leaning down to try kissing Len and practically growled at how eagerly Len returned the kiss. At least until Mick pulled away once more. “That’s nice. What else do you humans do?” Mick asked, his hands starting to explore Len’s body.

“Let me show you,” Len offered and the sex that followed had been so good and everything Len imagined what sex would be like with Mick if it was possible. 

He hated waking up to stained sleep pants and nine year old Lisa sleeping obliviously beside him. He only felt a little guilt for wishing a humanoid Mick was beside him instead.

“That was fun, do humans always have so much fun with sex?” Mick asked suddenly.

Len felt his heart stop and his blood run cold in his veins. Mick had a psychic bond with him and Lisa, it was how they communicated.

“Captain?” Mick asked, obviously picking up on Len’s distress.

“That- Mick- you!?” Len exclaimed loudly, struggling for words.

“Well, yeah. Thought you knew it was me? It ain’t that much harder to get into a mind when I’m already connected to it to talk,” Mick pointed out like it was no big deal.

It was a big deal. A huge deal. Len just had sex with Mick and he thought it was a dream. Mick now knew Len wanted Mick as a sex partner. Len just had sex with Mick. It was their first time and he had thought it was a dream. 

Groaning, Len laid back in bed, not quite sure when he sat up, and covered his face with a pillow. Maybe he could suffocate himself and not have to deal with having had psychic sex with Mick.

A small fist punched in him the side. “Shut up, bozos, I’m trying to sleep,” Lisa grumbled.

Oh god, he just had psychic sex with Mick while his little sister was right there.

“I’m leaving. I’ll be back later,” Len said abruptly, forcefully not paying attention to Mick as he threw on clean clothes and fled the ship. Tamaran didn’t have any rules about drinking age though their drinks weren’t exactly safe for human consumption. Len really did not care, anything to escape this reality for a couple hours.

~*~

Len and Lisa had been more than a little scared when the ship closed up after they boarded it but they really freaked out when it took flight without any input from them.

Len scrambled to the cockpit, trying to understand what was happening. The ship must have had a preprogrammed destination in mind and was just waiting for it’s never returning crew to take off. Maybe it was an AI that had marked them as stowaways and was transporting them to port authorities. Even if it was a Martian ship, not that it looked like one, they had to be going somewhere.

“Any suggestions for a destination would be nice. All I got was you two didn’t want to be here. Like me,” a voice from nowhere announced.

An AI then, a very smart AI with maybe some exterior monitors. What kind of ship was this?

“Uh…” Len stuttered trying to think. He hadn’t exactly thought of where to go beyond away from dad. Mars was risky because of its alliance with Earth but Martians were psychic and would probably be sympathetic to him and Lisa trying to escape Dad. At least enough to help them escape further rather than force their return. “Mars.”

“And that is where?” The AI demanded testily and Len had never heard of an AI with such personality before. 

“It’s the fourth planet from the sun, dummy,” Lisa spoke up before Len could. She was clearly over being scared of being on a ship they were in no control of.

The AI said nothing but Len could see they were leaving Earth’s atmosphere from the view ports. They did it, they had escaped dad. Lisa was safe, for now anyways. Len sunk to the floor in relief and simply watched as space became all Len could see.

“He okay?” The AI asked, somewhere between concern and not actually caring.

“Lenny gets like this sometimes, he’s fine. I’m Lisa and you? What’s your name?” Lisa asked as she settled on the floor next to Len, leaning into his side until Len put an arm around her.

“I don’t think humans can pronounce it. Mick’s the only part I think humans could speak, so that’ll do. I guess,” Mick said sounding so unsure and hesitant and very unlike an AI.

Len frowned as he thought over it the entire conversation. “Mick, what are you?”

“I’m the ship, ain’t it obvious?” Mick asked in return, sounding confused he even had to clarify.

Len had not heard of any aliens that had sentient space ships beyond Martians. still, if a Martian can do it so could some other species and the ship was about as alien as they came in design to Len’s knowledge. 

“Anyways, glad you two came along. I was getting bored collecting dust. And hungry. Was just gonna leave on my own but I don’t know where I am. Bastards that caught me kept me locked up before dumping me here. Least you planet-siders I can connect with psychically,” Mick explained as the moon came and went along their path.

Planet-siders? Well, if you were a spaceship Len supposed that made sense. 

“We’re humans,” Len explained and thought over how Mick’s situation was not that opposing from their own. “Mick, how do you feel about us traveling with you? After Mars.”

“Fine with me, not like I know where to go from here. Never been to this part of space before. Don’t think any of my kind has,” Mick added and Len could hear - sense? - the fear Mick tried to hide.

Len nodded and smiled broadly, “Well then, Mick, you got yourself a Captain and first mate.”

~*~

Len had only meant to be gone for a couple hours but Tamaran ale was potent stuff with weird side effects. So it was closer to three days before he got back to Mick and Lisa. He found the two of them talking in the cockpit though Len frowned a little at how long it took him to get there. Was it just him or had Mick somehow gotten bigger?

“You really think this will work?” Mick was asking but it sounded like it was already done.

“Mick, if we knew you could grow more rooms, we would have had you do it ages ago,” Lisa reassured him which, wait. What?

“Mick can grow new rooms?” Len demanded in shock.

“Yep. We now have a kitchen, a rec room, and I have my own bedroom now,” Lisa explained with false cheer that had Len’s shoulders stiffening. “It’s almost worth having to explain sex to Mick and having you ditch us for three days Lenny.”

“Explain- You’re _nine_!”

“I still know how to use the search engine on your tablet. It’s not the worst thing I’ve looked up,” Lisa said as she waved said device in her hand. “Also, Mick’s kind are apparently like space fish, they lay eggs and fertilize them without any sex.”

“I like Space Fish. Much better than Prometheans. Makes it more awful that planet-siders did creepy stuff to build androids based off my kind,” Mick added in, apparently missing the second crisis Len was having within three days.

“Anyways, now you have your own room so you can have sex with Mick and I will never have to give Mick Sex Ed ever again,” Lisa interjected her tone growing very dangerous by the end of it.

Len would happily agree to her threat if he never had to deal with his sex life and Lisa’s awareness of it in the same conversation ever again.

“Now, you two talk things out while I go get some sleep in my new room,” Lisa suggested strongly before practically dancing down the hall to a room that had not previously existed.

The quiet became strained in the cockpit.

“Uh, sorry, but not sorry for invading your dreams, the sex was fun and good. Can we do it again?” Mick asked eagerly.

Len buried his face in his hands and contemplated going round two with Tamaran ale. “I- I want more than just sex with you, Mick. I want it to be you and me, only you and me. No other… sex partners for either of us,” Len forced himself to admit. So much about his feelings were already known, why bother to keep the rest of it secret?

“Alright,” Mick agreed easily, of course he did if his kind reproduced the way Lisa said they did. “You know, with the psychic link you don’t have to be sleeping for us to have sex. Though it probably helps,” Mick added and Len could just hear the underlying request for ‘more sex now please’.

Len scrubbed at his face with his hands one last time. How was this his life? “New rule, we only do this when I’m alone in my room,” Len added as he made his way to the room he no longer shared with Lisa.

~*~

Len’s less than happy to explain the truth of Mick’s nature. He worked hard to have the rest of the universe thinking Mick was the rather isolated mad pilot of the Heatwave rather than the ship itself. If people worked out Mick really was a ‘Promethean’, they’d always be hunted. Mick would be torn apart just so others could try to figure out how his kind worked. It would not matter to them that Mick was sentient. Or worse, they would go after the rest of Mick’s kind so they would have the best space armada in the universe. 

Mick reacts to Len’s displeasure by playing tricks on Rip Hunter.

“Even if the _Heatwave_ truly is a sentient ship, I fail to see how this is connected to the invasion I wish to prevent,” Rip said as he struggled to free his coattails from yet another door Mick has closed early on him. Hunter’s nose still looked red from the rather unfortunate encounter with Mick’s displeasure.

“Can I space him?” Mick asked, clearly done with Rip being so belittling.

“We’re planet-side,” Len reminded him.

“Oh, I know it won’t kill him this way, but then he won’t be my problem,” Mick explained cheerfully, quite taken with the idea of giving Rip the boot.

“Simply fascinating, how did we miss all these years you were sentient?” Gray asks, completely oblivious to the contention building by Rip’s presence.

“About that, the Space Fish found were probably corpses. Even Mick’s kind don’t live forever,” Len explained going for the kinder answer since he liked Gray. 

“Or they thought the voice they were hearing was an AI. Or they couldn’t hear Mick’s kind. Not every species is compatible,” Lisa added a lot more heartlessly. She always was protective of Mick in her own way. Then again both of them are hunted by others because of what they are. 

Gray flinched at the implications. Jax and Raymond looked equally unhappy at the idea. Sara and the Hawks were much better at keeping their feelings hidden.

“Back to Hunter’s question, Mick, when you meet back up with your kind what were you going to tell them about Earth?” Len demanded.

“For planet-siders you’re not so bad. Fun to travel around with. Oh, and sex. Can’t forget the sex,” Mick added, his voice getting a gravel tone to it. One that Mick usually only got when he was trying to get Len back to his room for some fun. 

“Sex?” Sara asked as she looked between Len and Lisa for an explanation.

Lisa smiles flirtatiously at the blonde before saying with a saccharine voice, “Well, you know what they say about captains and their ships.”

Len’s grateful he’s had over two decades of experience in Lisa and Mick oversharing to lose his cool over his sex life becoming so blatantly known. 

“How does that even work?” Raymond asks in a tone that’s all about the logistics of it than any judgement.

“Psychic links have their perks,” Len quickly answered with a shrug, hoping to cut Lisa and Mick off from a more detailed explanation.

Sara laughed before asking incredulously, “Earth is going to get invaded by a bunch of horny space ships?” 

“Wait, what?” Mick asked in return because of course he had not been there for the recruitment spiel.

“No it won’t, because Mick isn’t going to tell the rest of his kind about Earth, now will he?” Len did not so much ask as ordered.

“Uh, sure but that might not stop it,” Mick said ever so helpfully. “Genetic memory and all that.”

“What?”

“Just cause there ain’t any of my kind in this part of space now doesn’t mean another won’t find the eggs I’ve been depositing for the past 28 Earth years,” Mick explained, sounding a bit chagrined. “I ran out of things to improve and had to do something with all the excess energy I was building up. Eggs take up a lot of energy.”

Len took a moment to absorb the fact that Earth being invaded really was going to be all his and Mick’s fault.

Lisa on the other hand looked like she maybe had a plan. “It’s going to sound crazy but what if we have the invasion happen sooner?”

“What are you thinking?” Len asked because his sister was a metahuman with foresight abilities. Almost like Cisco’s but forward instead of lateral. If anyone had a plan for getting them successfully out of this mess, it would be his sister.

~*~

Reuniting Mick with his kind had always been on Len and Lisa’s to do list. They had some clues as to where the big schools might be swimming about but nothing concrete. Mick was never too worried about finding them and preferred to do what Len and Lisa wanted since their lives were so short. Len guessed they all knew after he and Lisa were dead Mick would continue the search on his own.

Now they had seven others with access to a time traveling AI to help them. It cut down the search to a couple months and coming across a school was more than a little nerve-wrecking.

Mick was so ridiculously tiny compared to the behemoths of his kind.

“Those are the old ones. Only about 1 in fifty thousand of us make it to that size. Grandpa’s even bigger,” Mick said as little swarm of baby Space Fish, perhaps only big enough to carry a single seated human, flew over to inspect Mick before moving on. “Kind of tiny for my age, should be about double what I am now but I was playing dead.”

That was kind of alarming since Mick had already expanded so Sara, Jax, and the professor could travel with them while everyone else was on the Waverider. Mick could have made room for everyone, but Mick really only like the halves of Firestorm and Lisa liked Sara.

Len pointedly did not listen to Mick and Lisa’s overshare sessions. Sara looked to be enjoying her second go at life very much.

“Is that who we’re going to see?” Sara asked as she continued to study all the Space Fish.

“Yeah, he might remember what it’s like to have planet-siders travel with us. Not personally but genetic memory only goes back so many generations,” Mick explained as he aimed towards a large asteroid Len was starting to suspect was actually Grandpa.

“No way, your grandpa the Deathstar?” Jax demanded.

“That’s no moon,” Mick cheerfully replied because as soon as they had a rec room they had watched every iconic science fiction movie humanity ever made. Len was so proud.

Mick got quiet after that which everyone took to mean he got busy explaining everything to grandpa and getting advice in return. They settled in for a couple card games as Mick worked things out.

“Well, I got good news and bad news,” Mick said almost five hours after going quiet.

“Well? Do please share,” Rip demanded over the open comm line between Mick and the _Waverider_. 

“So, Grandpa will make sure we don’t go invading Earth. Helps I gave him some other species we can bond with, we definitely used to have travel companions way back when. Helped us navigate parts of space we hadn’t explored yet to make it safer for the rest of the school to follow. Downside is, Grandpa wants to send some scouts to go ahead with us to Earth to smooth things out. Congrats, you all get your own Space Fish,” Mick explained sounding less than pleased.

“Mick?”

“Firestorm’s got to stick together so that’s one less Scout than Grandpa wants. You’re stuck with me, Captain, but Lisa’s gotta go with another fish,” Mick grumbled and oh.

“I’m a grown ass woman, Micky. I don’t mind playing navigator for a while as long as I get back to you two,” Lisa was quick to reassure and Len understood. Mick was home and family for them, no way was she going to give him up for good. “Think of this as a very delayed honeymoon. You and Lenny deserve some alone time.”

“Gideon does report positive changes to the timeline are already starting to occur,” Rip very begrudgingly reported.

“Earth is saved. Woo-hoo. Honeymoon it is,” Len said dryly just to watch Jax and Gray squirm a little. No wonder Mick and Lisa were so fond of oversharing when it made someone else squirm.

Len supposed if the Space Fish secret was over he was going to get enjoy making a lot of people uncomfortable. He found himself not caring as long as no one started a fight over it. Len was well aware his relationship with Mick was odd but he would not trade it for anything.

**Author's Note:**

> ETA: comment moderation on for reviewers that wish to leave a private review (please specify so).


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